moonslav59

I hope you continuing pessimism subsides, soon, but it is getting harder and harder to find a silver lining. We have played more .500> teams than anyone else, so maybe when we start playing worse teams, we can cheer up, a bit.

Certainly, Crawford could start. I'm not sure about messing with Winckowski's success as a 2 inning guy, but we can't go much longer, as is. The SP'er depth on the farm has not stepped it up (Mata, Walter and Murphy have looked unimpressive in AAA.) Paxton is looking more and more like a non-factor, but maybe time will change that. (I'm not hopeful, there.) How many more starts do these guys get, before we think about a change? Kluber looked okay in 2 of his 5 starts, and did not look bad in another, where Bleier allowed 2 IRs to score. He will likely get several more starts. Sale is hard to figure. Sometimes command is the last thing a pitcher recovers, after a long time away from pitching, but how many more starts can we wait and wait? Could using him in the pen, help him regain? Whitlock on the IL hurts like hell, even though he was not doing all that well. Pivetta is not doing what I hoped he could do. I don't see him being demoted from the rotation ahead of these others, though. Bello needs to shine, and soon! We've gone way too long on addressing rotation upgrades. We've kept adding #3's and #4's hoping they'd pitch like #2's. You get what you pay for, and we are seeing it, now.

It is still very early in the season, but let's take a look at how our top prospects are doing and how some lower ones seem to be making an early push up the rankings. (sox prospects.com's rankins) 1, Mayer .785 A+ 2. Casas .576 MLB 3. Bleis .691 A- 4. Rafaela .770 AA 5. Mata 5.12 ERA AAA 6. Yorke .948 AA 7. Romero on IL with back issues 8. Perales 10.29 ERA 9. Walter 4.19 ERA 10. Paulino .538 A+ All in all, except for Yorke, the rest have not been very impressive, to say the least. Some promising starts: 12. Drohan 0.78 ERA AA 15. EValdez .858 MLB 16. E R-C 1.08 ERA A- 18. Jordan .851 A+ 19. Hickey .969 A+ 24. Abreu .855 AAA 25. Guerrero 2.57 ERA AA 26. Hamilton .911 AAA 30. Meidroth .855 A+

The leashes have to be getting shorter and shorter on some of these guys. Crawford is looking like he deserves another chance at the rotation, and although I hate messing with Wink, maybe he deserves a chance, too. Maybe we need to shake the line-up a little, too. Duran, Kike, Dugo and Turner seem to be doing better. Yoshida is coming around, and even Valdez is looking like he should get a longer and more extensive look. Too bad he has no position. I'm not advocating major shake-ups or demotions, but how long will the players doing the best be kept on the bench? Leaders in OPS (rank in PAs) 1.544 Duvall (on IL) 13th 1.054 Duran 12 .857 Valdez 16 .856 Devers 3 .843 Dugo 1 .831 Yoshida 5 .811 McGuire 11 .770 Turner 2 .705 Kike 4 .662 Ref 9 .590 Casas 6 .528 Wong 8 .515 Chang 10 .458 Arroyo 7 Best OPS Against and PAs Against Ranking: .392 Jansen 14th (understandable as the closer) .519 Wink 6th .627 Crawford 5th .710 Houck 1st .734 Schreiber 10th .737 Bleier 11th .738 Brasier 9th .755 Martin 15th (IL) .789 Pivetta 4th .842 Kluber 3rd .938 Sale 2nd .944 Whitlock 7th .960 Ort 8th 1.072 Bello 12th It's understandable guys like Sale, Kluber, Pivetta and Whitlock have the most IP, but how much longer do we keep pitching our worst performers the most?

It's very hard to acquire any player from April to early June and after the deadline is against the rules, if it's a good player. I thought that was a given, except for the one poster who kept saying, over and over, that Bloom should have acquired a 1Bman, last May. Maybe saying a dime a dozen is hyperbole, but to me, it's easier to find a decent 1Bman than just about any other position. The one you get may not work out, but that happens with many acquisitions.

DH platoon players are a nickel a dozen!

Thanks. I wonder who will end up doing better.

The Sea Dog pitchers have been on fire, pretty much all year. No wonder they are 13-5. Here are all the pitchers with 7.1+ IP and their OPS Against: .311 Whitlock .374 Drohan 26:4 K:BB .388 Sharp .401 Nail .408 Van Belle .448 Denlinger (7.1 IP German trade, 11:1 K:BB) .486 Miller 12:2 .519 Webb .526 Olds .558 Gomez 14:4 .622 Arias .663 Guerrero Only one pitcher above .664! .840 Liu

I'm not sure why, and I'm assuming you disagree that finding and acquiring a decent 1Bman is easier than a SP, SS, CF'er, C, 2Bman... Maybe because a lot of aging players end up at 1B? Toronto paid us to take Pearce. Yes, they got Espinal, who has worked out okay. Millar, as I believe was about to go play in Japan, when we talked him into signing with us for chump change. I'm not big on names of players from other teams, but I seem to remember that guy Chio was traded for for not much, as was Carlos Santana, last year. Maybe you can find guys like them at every position, and I am wrong, but they seem easier to come by, to me. Try getting a decent SP, closer, SS....

1Bmen are not "a dime a dozen" in April-May. There are none, at any cost. Hopefully, by the deadline, we won't need a 1Bman, but if we do, we should be able to add a decent hitting 1B at minimal cost. Whether he works out or not is up for grabs. Pearce did in '18, Shaw did in '21, but Hosmer did not in '22. My point was, and still is, when you compare the comp package need to acquire a 1Bman vs just about every other position, it is way cheaper. "Pennies on the dollar."

ALE Teams vs the rest of MLB (vs all non ALE teams) 16-3 TBR 13-3 BAL 12-7 TOR 10-6 BOS 12-8 NYY ALE vs .500> Teams 6-4 TBR (10 gms) 7-5 TOR (12 games) 11-9 NYY (20 games) 6-6 BAL (12 games) 10-13 BOS (23 games)

What the player does afterwards can be one criteria, but then think about the 2021 Travis Shaw, the 2018 Steve Pearce, the 2003 and 2004 Kevin Millar.

Yes, but only examples of cheap ones. Millar was cheap when we added him, first. Shaw was cheap at the deadline in '21, and in the offseason before 2022, but he sucked in '22. (He did have a record of being a good hitter, though.) Hardly anybody heard of Espinal, when we traded him for Pearce, and Toronto paid almost his whole remaining salary. Finding 1Bman with good hitting records and adding them to your roster can be very inexpensive. Do you disagree? Can we say, at today's dollars, $2-3M/ yr is "cheap?" Maybe a few years back $1.5-2.5M?

What did we have to pay to acquire Millar? Isn't that what we are talking about? (Not to keep a successful player.)

OK. We both know "a dime a dozen" can't mean a dime, when min wage is over $500K. We traded for Pearce, which is what this is about. He was not making close to $6M, when we added him. Shaw was dirt cheap. That's two. Count Millar as 3 and that's 3 in 2 decades. 3 per team x 30 teams is more than a dozen. Are you really arguing it's not easy to find inexpensive 1Bman with histories of being decent to good hitters in the off season and at the deadline? How about when compared to other positions?

Kluber will still get paid and pitch somewhere. Will the Bumgarner DFA mean AZ will never sign another big FA pitcher?

It's hard to imagine Paxton trying to justify being ML ready, right now, but maybe after a couple good starts... (assuming that ever happens.)

Moreland and Pearce were cheap. Travis Shaw in 2021. I think we paid Millar $2M back in '03. That may be 2 or 3 dimes a dozen, but he was not expensive. That is just Sox examples. I can easily find a dozen more.

Many GM do not look at just the most recent numbers, but in his case, it looks like they are. BTW, the Sano sample size you mentioned is about a third of the one you brought up on Casas.

It was meant to be a 24/7/365 point being made. This time of year, hardly anyone is "available." We named some that could have been signed over the winter. We can go back and look at past winters and summer trade deadline deals. 1B has to be the easiest position to fill. "Dimes" are now millions, but some can be acquired for way less than other positions. The Padres paid us to take Hosmer, last summer. The compensation for Steve Pearce was not thought to be all that much, but Espinal proved to be worth 2 dimes.

Every year, decent hitting 1Bmen are traded for peanuts- just not in April. What did we get for Moreland? (I forgot, too.) Who is available, right now? Has Sano signed, yet?

We play them way less, this year, so in theory, that should help.

The Sox currently have the 9th best record in the AL at 13-13. We are 0.5 GB #8 LAA. We are 1.5 GB #5 HOU/MN/NYY and a WC berth. We are 3.5 GB #4 TEX. We are 4 GB from the 2nd best record in the AL (BAL.) To put this in perspective, had we just beaten the O's, yesterday, we'd 8th, a half game out of the WC slot and just 2 GB BAL and 2nd place in the ALE. It's still very early, but it really looks like we have our heart set on a .500 season.

How about a guy who averages this over 650 PAs: .232 31 94 (.752 OPS) at minimum salary? (Hint: he's on our team.)

They don't keep a lot of players around, too long, but the ones they do, like Kiermaier are good on D. They have a great knack for trading away good players right before a steep decline.